


With Love, From War

by gonnaflynow



Series: Eruri Week 2014 [5]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Depression, Eruri Week, Iraq War, Long Distance Relationship, M/M, Pining, War, eruri - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2015-01-05
Packaged: 2018-03-05 08:57:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3113837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gonnaflynow/pseuds/gonnaflynow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erwin is shipped off to Iraq for a year-long reporting job.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> concept sparked from the wonderful baccuroth's eruri military AU. winter inspired by [this post](http://tokyoeruriren.tumblr.com/post/106116259663/ldr-eruris-where-they-open-each-others-gifts-over).
> 
> _Eruri Week Day Five – Distance/Separation_

**_Spring_ **

“Erwin, tell me there’s some way you can get out of this.”

“There’s nothing I can do, Levi. It’s been decided. They need me over there.”

“ _I_ need you _here_.”

Erwin hugged Levi, a little tighter, a little closer. It wouldn’t close the gap of the coming year’s absence, but he could try. 

“Levi, I’m so sorry,” he said quietly, sincerity so pure it almost hurt. “I hate this as much as you do. I want nothing more than to be by your side as long as I’m able. But the people are calling for me, their stories have to be told – my _heart_ is calling for me to do this – and I need to answer that call. And Levi, I hate, I _hate_ to put it this way, but that means both of us need to make sacrifices.”

“I know. I get it.” Levi’s chest began to grow heavy, his breaths short. Erwin tried to rub the tension out of his body: firm strokes on the small of his back just how he knew Levi liked it. “You have to go.”

“I feel so selfish,” Erwin whispered into Levi’s hair, a confession. “That I want to do this, and that it means leaving you behind.”

“They wouldn’t let you bring me with?”

A fierce protective hardness took over Erwin’s features like a bolt from the blue. “You wouldn’t be coming even if I was allowed to bring you. It’s dangerous.”

“You say that like you’re not going to be putting yourself in the path of firefights and bombs and who knows what fucking else over there.”

“Levi, what would I do if I lost you?!” The hands on Levi’s lower back lost some of their surety. “I can’t, I couldn’t. I don’t even want to think about…” Erwin trailed off with a shiver, the blood in his veins turning to ice at the thought of an attack on the base, Levi’s ravaged body, a plain coffin flying back across the Atlantic.

“And you think those aren’t the thoughts that will consume me for the next year?” Levi said quietly.

They both sat in somber silence, holding each other tight in the vain hope that they would never have to let go.

“I love you, Levi,” said Erwin, voice thick with emotion. “We’ll make it through this, together.”

Levi reached around, found Erwin’s hand, and squeezed.

  

**_Summer_ **

“I’m actually glad you’re not here,” Erwin joked, wiping the sweat from his brow as he settled into his seat in front of the computer. “If you thought summer in the city was bad, that’s _nothing_ compared to summer in the Middle East.”

“At least I have air conditioning,” Levi smirked, tempted to rub it in but foregoing the urge to do so as Erwin began to struggle out of his flak jacket. “What’s the temp out there, just so I can do you the favor of at least _imagining_ what you’re feeling right now.”

“A hundred and fifteen degrees.” Erwin tossed the jacket on the bed behind him, revealing a  sweat-soaked grey tank top underneath.

“Jesus. You weren’t kidding,” Levi whistled.

“Like a sauna, but without the hot naked men,” Erwin laughed.

“You fucking perv. I doubt I’d like to see the soldier’s faces if they heard you say that.”

“You’re probably right, as usual.” Erwin twisted the gold band around his finger out of habit before tugging on the collar of his shirt, trying in vain to cool himself off. “What’s going on around home?”

“You’re not missing much,” Levi groaned. “Work sucks, Hanji got a crazy new project in the lab that keeps her awake at all hours, and Mike’s been in what I’m pretty sure is some version of summer hibernation. We got together last week for beers, but I had to pay.”

“That doesn’t surprise me one bit,” Erwin smiled. “He’s always been like that. Think he says the humidity puts too much strain on his nose.” Levi’s barks of laughter crackled over Erwin’s laptop speaker. “Where did you go?”

“Oh, just that place down the street from Mike’s office, nothing special.”

“Anything else notable?”

“Nope. Mostly I’m at home sulking by myself, as I’m sure you’re aware.”

Erwin was very, very aware. He schooled his face before the pangs of longing had a chance to take over. “I know. Why don’t you go out for dinner somewhere nice this week? My treat.”

“Does nice mean takeout from that expensive snobby Thai place across town that somehow delivers here?”

“No, nice means get dressed up and go to a sit-down restaurant,” Erwin laughed. “Really, anywhere you like.” Silence greeted him in the aftermath of his suggestion.

“Unless I can bring my tablet and Skype you in from across the table, I don’t think that’s going to happen, Erwin,” Levi said quietly, eyes glassy as he focused on an object in the distance.

“That would be fun, if we could pull it off,” Erwin tried. “A Skype date.”

“Maybe.” Levi offered him a half-smile. “If we could find a place that would let us do it.”

“I’m sure you could find somewhere. I bet you could spin it as a military accommodation of sorts.” Erwin’s calm persona broke and he glanced sharply to the left as a commotion broke out outside the door to the barracks. It didn’t take long before the shouts grew more desperate, the thud of footsteps echoing in the small room as a siren sounded in the distance.

“Erwin?”

Erwin’s face had paled, and he was already reaching for his jacket. “Shit, Levi, I’m sorry, I’ve gotta go. Damn it. I’m sorry. I love you.”

“Love you too,” Levi called, the video snapping to black as Erwin hurriedly shut the lid to his laptop. Levi’s facade of a smile collapsed into a deep-set frown as the call window disappeared, hot, bitter tears carving tracks down his cheeks.

  

**_Fall_ **

Levi had begun to retreat in on himself as the days grew shorter. He stopped answering calls from Mike and texts from Hanji, both wanting and not wanting the solitude and hating himself for being unable to make up his mind. The longer he waited, the guiltier he got, until one day in a burst of self-directed frustration, he deleted the contact information and the text message threads for Mike and Hanji both, sitting in shocked silence for half an hour afterward.

Calls from Erwin became fewer and fewer as the autumn weeks dragged on. A small city near the base where he was stationed had been under a constant volley of fire for a month, which had meant that Erwin was off reporting on the action blow by literal blow. The last time Levi had called him, he had sustained a small shrapnel wound to the face, just under his left eye. All the reassurance in the world wouldn’t snap Levi out of his panic, and it took Erwin the better part of an hour to calm him down and assure him that yes, he was fine, yes, the wound was looked at as soon as he returned to the base and no, there wasn’t going to be any lasting damage to his skin or his eyesight. Both men hung up with tired lines set deep in their faces; Levi decided to take Erwin’s terseness towards the end of the call personally and went off to sulk in the living room with a pile of blankets and an episode of _Bones_.

The bed was quickly becoming Levi’s preferred location for sleeping, for working, and for eating, though he was ashamed to admit he had stooped that low. The rest of the house began to fall into stagnation: with no one to fill it with memories, Levi kept to the fewest amount of rooms possible, leaving the doors to the other rooms shut when he wasn’t in them, as if it was as simple as opening the door again and revealing that Erwin had never left all along. Some days, the smallest remembrances set him off into fits of anger, and the home slowly became a house, taking on the spartan look of a place never truly lived in. Even Levi’s rigorous cleaning habits had begun to slip, now that he had no one but himself to clean up after. It took until the dirty dishes in the sink had reached over the counter that something in him snapped, and he scrubbed, swept and polished until the sun set and his hands began to bleed.

Erwin, naturally perceptive and trained further by his job, took an astonishingly long time to realize how far Levi had sunk into the quagmire of apathy. By the time he noticed something was wrong, Levi hadn’t left the house in almost three weeks and had been surviving solely on takeout and the ragtag assortment of half-eaten cereal in the pantry – no milk. The bags under his eyes had sunken in and turned a worrying reddish-purple hue from debilitating insomnia, and his eyes, normally sharp and alert, had begun to glaze over from exhaustion.

“You’ve got to get yourself to a doctor,” Erwin chided, distress in his eyes. “You’re unwell, Levi. I’ll have them make a house call so you won’t have to drive.”

“Don’ need it,” he slurred. “Don’ need any dumb doctors. They can’t do anythin’ for me. Not about this stuff.”

“Levi, please, you have to take care of yourself!”

“Don’ tell me what to do, old man. You’re all the way across the globe. You just try an’ enforce that on me, Erwin. I’m a grown-ass man an’ I do what I want. This’s all your fault.”

Erwin didn’t try and hide the pain in his eyes this time. “You know that’s not true.”

“It is true!” Levi shouted, the dam of anger overflowing. “I can’t sleep, I can’t eat! I’m up all night worrying about your stupid ass and if I‘m gonna get a house call from the _military_ tellin’ me that they can’t even find your fuckin’ remains. Tell me again this isn’t your fault, you fuckin’ asshole. Trying to act all chivalrous as usual. ‘You’re unwell.’”

“Levi…”

“Do you even still care about me?!” he yelled, voice growing hoarse with dehydration and emotion. “Or did you find some other twink to _fuck_ around with while your _husband_ is conveniently halfway around the globe?” He broke off with a whimper, the bravado evaporating in an instant.

“Levi, I would never,” Erwin said quietly, eyes cast down to disguise the threatening tears. “I pledged myself to you seven years ago and I never looked back. You’re the only one in this world who matters to me, and nothing will make me break that promise. Do you understand? I love you even more than on the day we first met, or the day we wed, or the day we bought our house, or the day I left. I love you more with each passing moment. Nothing will ever come in the way of that.”

Levi’s chest rattled as he took a steadying breath. “I don’t know if I can do this, Erwin.”

“Try,” Erwin whispered, stroking the outline of Levi’s jaw on his monitor. “Try for me.”

 

**_Winter_ **

“Do you have your gift nearby?”

“I’ve had it under my bed since it got delivered ten days ago.”

“Ass.” Erwin smiled, basking in the insult. “How many times were you tempted to peek?”

“Not once,” said Erwin, the picture of earnestness. “I knew it would be worth it if I waited for you.”

“You fucker.” Levi yawned, suppressing an eye roll. “No one except you could be that fucking virtuous.”

“Is it still virtuous if it’s something I genuinely wanted to do?”

“Wait for your present?”

“Yes.”

Levi wrinkled his nose with disdain. “Quit your philosophical yapping and let’s open these things.” A small Christmas tree glowed in the background of the room where Levi sat, filling Erwin with warmth to know he had even bothered to set one up this year. “Who goes first?”

“Why don’t you?”

“I knew you’d fuckin’ say that,” Levi muttered, reaching behind the laptop to pull out a battered cardboard box and set it on the floor beside him. “But for once in my life, I’m going to insist that you go first. Don’t even try and fight me.”

“I won’t, it’s Christmas,” Erwin laughed, picking up the small parcel on his lap. “No fighting on Christmas.”

“Damn right. Now are you gonna open the thing or not?”

“Working on it,” Erwin grunted, slicing the packing tape with a utility knife and pulling a smaller package out of the box, elegantly wrapped with gold paper and a simple black ribbon. Erwin shook the box lightly, delighting in the way Levi leaned forward in anticipation. 

“Come on, you're killing me here,” Levi groaned, rolling his eyes as Erwin delicately slid his finger underneath the tape so as not to rip the wrapping paper.

“Hey, this is my gift, I should be the one saying that!” A slim black box was finally freed from its prison of gold.

“You gonna open it?”

On the inside of the box rested a beautiful watch.

“Levi, this is marvelous, I don’t know what to say,” Erwin murmured, gently picking up the timepiece for closer examination.

“It has faces for three time zones, so you don’t have to keep doing the math all the time,” Levi said shyly.

“What a thoughtful gift,” Erwin smiled.

“Turn it over,” said Levi, biting back the lump of emotion in his throat.

An elegant engraving greeted Erwin on the back of the watch.

“A poem?”

“Would… would you read it to me?” Levi asked quietly. Erwin brought the watch closer to his face, squinting to read the fine script.

 

_One half of me is yours, the other half yours_

_Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours,_

_And so all yours._

 

“From _The Merchant of Venice_ ,” Levi added hastily. “In case you hadn’t read it before.” He got no immediate response from the other line and when he looked inquisitively into the camera, a soft sniff came from the other line. Levi realized Erwin was crying.

“Erwin?”

“This… this is so beautiful, Levi. Thank you.” He wiped at his eyes with the back of his hand, fresh tears budding anew as he fastened the watch on his left hand. “And it fits perfectly. I’m going to treasure this dearly. Thank you, Levi. Thank you so much.”

“Don’t you start crying, you big bastard, then I’ll start crying!” Levi whined, tears already springing unbidden to his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Erwin laughed. “I’m blown away, I really am. I got a little overwhelmed. Please, open your gift, I don’t want you to feel left out.”

“It’s fine, Erwin, really,” said Levi, blinking rapidly to clear his vision and reaching for the package by his feet. 

“You have to open the side that says ‘This Side Up’,” Erwin interjected, pulling out his handkerchief to dab at his face. “It’s important.”

“I’m an editor, I believe I know how to read.” Levi rolled his eyes as Erwin laughed good-naturedly, sliding two bundles out of the box. “Erwin, you asshole, we said one gift each!”

“I know. But I love spoiling you,” Erwin grinned. “One of the things was supposed to be a homecoming present, but I had a feeling you might need it sooner than that, so it doesn’t have to count.”

“I might need it, you say.” Levi bit his bottom lip.

“Open the smaller one first,” Erwin instructed. “That’s your real Christmas present.”

A few moments of rusting and crinkling later, Levi sat with a brand new hardcover book in his hand.

“Erwin, this is great, but... I thought book this wasn’t going to even be out for another few months?! How did you...”

Erwin couldn’t contain his giddy smile if he tried. “Open up the front cover.”

Levi did as instructed, but where he might have expected a personalized dedication there sat a phone number.

“...the fuck is this, Erwin.”

“Would you believe me if I told you that’s the author’s phone number?”

The book hit the edge of the table with a thump as Levi’s jaw dropped. “No fucking way.”

“I knew he was your favorite, so I made a few phone calls, pulled a few strings...”

“I can call him. Right now, at this number.”

“Well, it’s late where you are, I don’t think that would be very wise—”

“Erwin, this is incredible. Thank you. Wow. I can’t believe you.” Levi’s jaw finally closed as he set the book to the side, stroking the spine reverently.

“Open the other one?” Erwin suggested softly.

“Fine, you impatient nutcase,” Levi scoffed, picking up a parcel wrapped much less precisely than the last. The reason was clear when the wrappings fell away: inside sat a beautiful sweater, knitted up in blues, golds, and greys in the softest alpaca wool.

“I came across a group of women who were knitters by trade,” Erwin explained, “and I just couldn’t pass up the chance. I know how cold you get in the winter.”

Levi held the sweater up to his face to feel the softness of the wool and had to choke back a sudden sob.

“This smells like you.”

“They finished it a little early and I had time before I needed to ship it out, so I slept with it every night,” Erwin admitted. “I know I haven’t been around as much for you recently, and I know the last year has been tough on both of us, but I hope this will tide you over until I come home.”

When Levi brought the sweater away from his face, Erwin noticed that he, too, had begun to cry.

“...thank you. Thank you, Erwin.”

Erwin felt tears once again gather at the corners of his eyes. “Do you want to try it on?”

“Y-yeah, yeah, I’ll do that.” Levi aggressively wiped away the tears gathering by his chin, yanking his old sweater over his head and tugging the new one on. If he hadn’t known better, he could have sworn it was made to fit him and him alone: the sleeves were exactly the right length, where he could cuff them not by necessity but if he felt the urge, and the body was just loose enough that it still looked fitted but made Levi feel as if he was wearing something that didn’t belong to him, something that belonged to someone a little bit larger. 

“How does it feel?”

“It’s perfect,” Levi sobbed. “It feels like yours and mine, at the same time.” He brought a hand up to his mouth, stifling more jerky whimpers and relying on Erwin’s scent to bring him back to earth as he sat down in front of the computer. 

“I love you so much, Levi,” Erwin whispered. “From even deeper than the bottom of my heart.”

Levi held his hand up to the camera, as if to wipe away Erwin’s tears. “I love you too, Erwin.”

“Three weeks.”

Levi took a deep breath and dared to hope. “Three weeks.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Eruri Week Day Six – Reunion_

The next week and a half almost went _too_ well. Erwin had been stuck on base doing administrative wrap-up paperwork and hadn’t gotten much time out in the field (“Good,” Levi had said, “I’m tired of you playing soldier.”) but was itching to get back in the thick of the action before his time was up.

“You can’t bring that paperwork _home_?”

“I wish,” sighed Erwin. “It can’t leave the base, government regulations. I’m sure you can imagine.”

“Ooh, Erwin Smith and the Top Secret Government Documents. I sense a Dan Brown-esque novel in the making.”

“Sounds like a bad James Bond knockoff, actually,” Erwin laughed.

“Except you’re hotter than James Bond.”

A sultry look slipped onto Erwin’s face, voice going husky and low. “Do you want to know all the things I’m going to do to you when I get home? I’m going to open the door, scoop you up in my arms, and lay you out on the bed, teasing you until you can't take it anymore, and then I'm going to fuck you so slow and so hard and so _good_ —”

“Jesus, Erwin.” Levi drew his lower lip into his mouth as he palmed his stirring cock. “Fuck. I'd... I'd like that.”

“And when we’re done I’m going to cuddle you and we’re not going to clean up first.” Erwin looked positively triumphant.

“I think that was a given,” Levi laughed. “Knowing you, you’ll probably just fall asleep after you’re done ruining my ass.” It was easy to fall back into the old banter. Maybe the re-entry period wouldn't be so bad. "Your floppy dick would probably still be _in_ my ass. And then I'll be stuck to you with my own semen and unable to escape when you start snoring."

“Sounds positively delightful.”

“Old perv.” Levi couldn’t keep a small smile off his face, looking away from the camera out of habit. “Come home.”

“Just a little longer,” Erwin promised. With his chin propped in his hand, wedding band glinting in the low light, and a blush on his cheeks from his laughter and the heat, Erwin looked more than a little lovesick. “Your patience will be rewarded.”

“It damn well better be!” Levi exclaimed as Erwin dissolved into a fit of laughter.

 

The call came ten days before Erwin's return. Levi had just stepped out of the shower, hand clenching the towel slung low on his hips. 

"Hello?"

"Have I reached Levi Ackerman?" A soft woman's voice rang clear over the phone. 

"Speaking. How can I help you?"

"Sir, I'm afraid I have to be the bearer of bad news. It's about your husband."

Levi's stomach dropped along with his towel. "What happened?"

"He was injured this morning while out on a patrol with the Delta company. They got caught in a surprise firefight, and Mr. Smith took a bullet to the shoulder and the stomach."

"Where is he now? What's his condition?" Levi gripped the phone with both hands, the plastic crackling under the pressure.

"He's being transported to the nearest military hospital. I expect he should be in surgery within the hour."

"What's the protocol for this? Where does he go after the surgery? And the extent of the damage?" Levi couldn't help the spill of questions any more than he could help the knocking of his knees.

"I'm afraid it's too early to tell, sir," the woman sighed. "He'll be flown to the Walter Reed Medical Center in DC once we get him stable. I'm told... I was told it wasn't looking good. I'm sorry."

 _Fuck. Shit. Erwin._ "And if..." Levi took a shaky breath. "If he doesn't make it?"

"Someone will be in contact as soon as your husband comes out of surgery. There's nothing else we can do for now but let the doctors take care of him." Tremors had begun to wrack Levi's body, rooting him to the spot as he shook with the effort of holding in a sob, a scream. "Sir? Are you still on the line?"

"Yeah, I'm here," Levi whispered. "And there's nothing I can do until then?"

A pause. “I’m sorry, Mr. Ackerman. We'll be in touch as soon as any developments come to light.”

“Okay. ...okay. Thank you.”

A soft click at the other end of the line released Levi and he sunk to the floor, still clutching the phone in both hands. His mind stayed astoundingly, thankfully blank for several long minutes until a second phone call jolted him out of his reverie. He picked up without even looking at the caller ID.

“Yes??”

“Levi?” Hange’s voice filtered quietly through the speaker. “I’m watching the news right now, the story is just breaking. Erwin… Levi, oh my god.”

Levi closed his eyes to concentrate on the broadcast in the background, but all he could hear was the steady whirr of a helicopter and the muffled rumble of the announcer. God damn the twenty-four hour news cycle.

“I just hung up with someone from the Army a few minutes ago,” Levi said numbly.

“...is it okay if I ask what they said?” Hange said carefully.

Levi swallowed thickly, the tears dropping off his face mixing in with the remaining dampness on his body. “He got shot in the shoulder and the stomach. He’s in surgery now.”

“What can I do? Would company be a good thing for you right now?”

“I… I dunno,” Levi muttered. “I haven’t even seen you in a couple weeks and—”

“Doesn’t matter. I know. I’m throwing on my coat right now, I’ll be there in twenty. And I’ll pick up some food. Levi? Still with me?”

“Yeah,” he whispered.

“I’ll be there soon. Hang in there. You don’t have to go through this alone.”

“...thanks, Hange.”

Levi could hear her sad smile through the phone. “He'll pull through, Levi. He's nothing if not a fighter, at least when it comes to you. Believe in him.”

Levi nodded before he remembered that she couldn’t see him, then uttered his goodbyes and hung up. He could feel his motions becoming robotic as he stood, towel left on the floor in favor of an old pair of jeans and the sweater from Erwin. His scent was concentrated mostly around the collar, sweat and skin and a hint of dark cologne, and Levi stood and drank it in until Hange’s car pulled up outside. 

 

Hange stayed with Levi and distracted him until the call came in, knowing that if she let him languish in his thoughts there was no going back. When it finally did come, the tension in the room palpably dissipated once Levi hung up the phone, sinking back into the couch with a thin sigh. Both bullets and the related shrapnel were successfully removed, the man told him, but Erwin was going to have some nerve damage from where he was shot in his shoulder. The bullet in his abdomen thankfully didn't hit any major organs. He was lucky.

“When are they going to fly him home?”

“Tonight,” said Levi, tucking his head between his legs. “Oh my god, Hange.”

Without needing to be told twice, Hange pulled Levi into a tight hug, rubbing his back as he quietly drained himself of tears.

 

Erwin’s possessions came in a box ahead of him. Seeing them without Erwin in tow sent Levi’s mind hurtling down treacherous, morbid paths at top speed, so without a second thought, the box was banished to the office until Erwin could go through it himself.

Levi planted himself by Erwin’s bedside minutes after he was finally situated in the hospital. He became a permanent installation, refusing to leave for sleep, food, or otherwise, unless the nurses or Hange and Mike began to nag him. At one in the afternoon on Erwin’s second day back, Levi woke with a soft grunt of pain to find Erwin gazing at him reverently, awake but not yet alert, and blinking slowly as he tried to get a grasp on his surroundings and the chain of events that brought him here. 

"Hi," Erwin said weakly, head tilting to the side as he tried to remember how to work his mouth. 

"Fucking hi to you, too.” Levi whispered. “Don't ever scare me like that again."

"You're wearing the sweater." Erwin's smile was thin and sickly but made Levi's heart flutter all the same.

"Of course I'm wearing the sweater. I haven't taken it off since I opened your package."

"I'm so glad," Erwin said quietly, closing his eyes. 

"Guess you were right." Levi laughed unconvincingly, stroking Erwin's pale hand. "I did need it before you came home."

"I wish you didn't have to," Erwin muttered. "I'm sorry, Levi."

"What for? This isn't your fault."

Erwin opened his eyes again, fixing Levi with a gaze that pierced down to his soul. 

"I wanted to come home to you in one piece. I wanted _you_ to be in one piece when _I_ came home. I've caused you so much anguish and heartache the past year, and this is just the cherry on top, isn't it?"

Levi removed his hand from atop Erwin's and folded them together in his lap. "Erwin, I'm not going to lie to you. I wouldn't know how. It was rough, really rough, really... _bad_. I don't know if you realized, I tried to keep it from you so you wouldn't worry..."

"I knew something wasn't right," Erwin murmured. "But I wanted to wait for you to open up and tell me, and I see now that was a mistake."

"Guess we both fucked up this time."

"Will you forgive me?"

Levi scoffed. "For what? Chasing your dream? Educating us idiotic Americans about what's really going on over there? Apology not accepted."

This got Erwin to crack a smile. "No. For not being there when you needed me most. I promised to take care of you, and I failed you in that regard. I can't even take care of myself," he added sadly, gesturing to his arm. "I'd be flattered if you even wanted to stay with me after this."

Levi used Erwin's bedridden state to his advantage and stood, looming over his husband with authority. "Please. It's going to take more than that to get rid of me." He pressed two fingers to Erwin’s cracked lips, silencing words unsaid. "Shut up and listen for a minute. I'm not going to deny that this whole affair fucking sucked for me, yes. But the important thing is that we kept it together. You're here, and alive. I'm here, and last I checked," Levi pinched the thin skin on the underside of his forearm for effect, "I'm still alive too. I don't think it would be easy for anyone to stay apart for that long, especially under those circumstances, but we fucking _did it_."

"Levi..."

Levi shook his head. "It's not like we can pick right back up where we left off, obviously, but... god _damn_ , Erwin, I'm just glad to have you back, nerve damage and all."

"Thank you."

"It's actually gonna be _weird_ having you around now," Levi mused. "I was so used to having the whole house to myself and not sharing anything."

"Except for the bedroom, it looks like you'll have the rest of the house to yourself for some time yet," Erwin laughed. "But hey, that's a pretty good deal for me, if I had to pick just one room."

"Why am I not surprised," said Levi, bringing a hand to his forehead, "that not even ten minutes after you've regained consciousness you'd be talking about sex."

"Hands get repetitive," Erwin shrugged, "as I'm sure you know. And you had the toys at least, damn it, those are a _lot_ better than your hand—"

"Oh my god, someone will hear," Levi hissed, ears burning in embarrassment. 

"They'll probably think I'm loopy from the pain meds. I don't care."

" _I_ care."

Erwin laughed a true laugh this time. "Let them think what they will. They don't get to take you home and have you ten different ways."

"Switch that statement around, sweetcheeks," groaned Levi. " _I'm_ taking _you_ home and _I'm_ probably going to have to do all the work for a while, sex-wise. If we even have sex, which we shouldn't. I suspect that would go against medical recommendations."

"God, how I missed you," Erwin sighed. 

"Yeah," said Levi, interlacing his fingers with Erwin's, wedding rings sliding together. "Yeah, me too."

 

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos appreciated so, so much. please let me know if you cried. it means I did my job right.
> 
> levi's sweater [here](http://s7d2.scene7.com/is/image/NationalGeographic/2001221?%24product320x320%24)


End file.
